# Old school cigars?



## Malcolm_the_Squid (Jul 5, 2015)

I used to work at a store where the main task was to sell tobacco products, mostly cigarettes; the majority of cigars we carried were machine rolled. I had a customer come in looking for Old Gold cigarettes, and upon hearing the request another customer quipped, "Old Mold? I didn't think they still made those!". As I got the gentlemen his cigarettes, I started to thing about smoking in the past and how brands have changed over the years. I'm relatively new to smoking, but I know some of the people here have been smoking for decades or more. So my question today is about old school cigars. Are there any cigars or brands that you long time smokers used to love but they don't make them any more? Anything they still make but it's changed drastically over the years? What was smoking like then versus now? Was the cigar culture different then?


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## Cigary (Oct 19, 2007)

Good question because Im from that decade(s) where cigars were something that were smoked by older gentlemen and were too often the machine made cigars. I actually was a fixture at the Tinder Box whey they first opened and at the ripe old age of 16 they looked at me like I was an anomaly and laughed when I bought a fist full of different cigars. Todays market is sooooooo much better..quality cigars from all over the world with profiles that made cigar from the 60's taste like cardboard. You don't know how fortunate you are to have a bumper crop of great cigars and manufacturers...even the bad ones today were better than what we suffered through in the golden days.


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## Bird-Dog (Oct 16, 2009)

The answers to those questions could fill a book... or two, or three!

My Dad was smoking machine-mades by 1960's when I was a kid. Like most everyday cigar smokers he had "his brand", and mostly stuck to it. They were drug-store cigars, but "better" machine-mades like Antonio y Cleopatra or Garcia y Vega, which he alternated between at various times.

He was part of the WWII generation and said he was the only one in his unit who smoked cigars. Most everyone else smoked cigarettes, but they all got rations of both. Apparently he made very favorable trades for their cigars with his cigarette rations. I suspect a lot of those 1940's cigars were Clear Havanas. 

I smoked the occasional cigar in my teens and early-20's in the late-1970's, mostly small cigars like Whiffs and Braniff's (thought those Braniff #2's made me look like Clint Eastwood, LOL). My first good cigar was a Cuban I smoked with my Dad in Hong Kong in about 1985. 

During the 1990's cigar boom he and I were both smoking handmade NC's most of the time. I think Cigary is right that overall quality is much better now. But, there were some decent cigars out there if you knew where to look. We smoked a lot of variety, but my go-to was Ernesto Carrillo's El Rico Habano. Everyone raved over his La Gloria Cubana's, but I found the fuller ERH's more to my liking, along with a number of Honduran cigars (and some of the few Nicaraguans available at that time)... Camacho, Padron, Excaliber, Maria Mancini, and a host of other brands like Lempira that are lost to history now.

The rest of my own story is better left for another time and place. But, let's just say, I never forgot that cigar I had in HK in 1985!


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## Malcolm_the_Squid (Jul 5, 2015)

curmudgeonista said:


> The answers to those questions could fill a book... or two, or three!
> 
> My Dad was smoking machine-mades by 1960's when I was a kid. Like most everyday cigar smokers he had "his brand", and mostly stuck to it. They were drug-store cigars, but "better" machine-mades like Antonio y Cleopatra or Garcia y Vega, which he alternated between at various times.
> 
> ...


This whole story is ****ing rad! Responses like this and the previous one from Cigary are why I posed this question. I'm especially new to smoking but I don't care what kind of beads to use in my humidor or what temperature to store my sticks at, etc. I mean I do care (honestly), but to me the history, mystery, and story of cigar smoking is what interests me. The sociology of cigar smoking if you will. Reading your submission to this thread makes me want to learn about the history of cigars and write a book. Thank you, and you too Cigary, for sharing your personal cigar histories. Reading your thoughts and musings on the subject is really quite enjoyable.


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## Bird-Dog (Oct 16, 2009)

Malcolm_the_Squid said:


> This whole story is ****ing rad! Responses like this and the previous one from Cigary are why I posed this question. I'm especially new to smoking but I don't care what kind of beads to use in my humidor or what temperature to store my sticks at, etc. I mean I do care (honestly), but to me the history, mystery, and story of cigar smoking is what interests me. The sociology of cigar smoking if you will. Reading your submission to this thread *makes me want to learn about the history of cigars and write a book*. Thank you, and you too Cigary, for sharing your personal cigar histories. Reading your thoughts and musings on the subject is really quite enjoyable.


Do it! Most of the cigar books out there only cover the history of cigars in brief. I'd love to read a well researched and thoughtful book from a sociological standpoint focusing on the cigar in culture over time.


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## Beartrapgun (Jun 5, 2014)

This one hits home for me. There are many reasons why I smoke cigars but I think this is an underlying one. My grandfather used to smoke cigars all the time. When I was about 5 I don't think I can remember a time when he didn't have one lit. He would always take me to the track to see the horses and then the stables after to feed the non racing horses. The entire time he always had a cigar lit. I can still remember the smell. It was always a Dutch master. I remember because he would always give the boxes to my parents for storage. Now he is older and hit hard by Parkinson's. I try and take him to the track to see the horses when I can.


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## Malcolm_the_Squid (Jul 5, 2015)

Beartrapgun said:


> This one hits home for me. There are many reasons why I smoke cigars but I think this is an underlying one. My grandfather used to smoke cigars all the time. When I was about 5 I don't think I can remember a time when he didn't have one lit. He would always take me to the track to see the horses and then the stables after to feed the non racing horses. The entire time he always had a cigar lit. I can still remember the smell. It was always a Dutch master. I remember because he would always give the boxes to my parents for storage. Now he is older and hit hard by Parkinson's. I try and take him to the track to see the horses when I can.


This is wonderful and powerfully touching. Thank you for sharing.


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## mi000ke (Feb 8, 2014)

This brings back memories. My father and my uncles all smoked machine made cigars back in the day (50 years ago) and that seems to be what most people smoked back then. I recall that my Uncle Sam smoked Dutch Masters, and my Uncle Milt smoked White Owls. My father smoked "the good stuff" - Garcia y Vegas, so that's what I began with at age 15 (along with a corncob pipe filled with Edgeworth Ready Rub, which my father also smoked). By the time I got to college in the late 60s, we had graduated to Parodis on the advice of the owner of the local smoke shop - which while machine made, were at least all tobacco. In the mid 70s we discovered Suerdiecke - a Brazilian cigar company that went out of business about 10 years ago. They were hand rolled, pretty tasty, not too expensive, and we felt like we had made the big time. I pretty much stuck with Parodis and Suerdieckes for years. I would run into a lot of old guys who smoked toscano style cigars, and it was kind of a cool way for the youngsters and oldsters to bond. My father eventually had a heart attack and had to stop smoking, but when he would visit me I would go outside and smoke a GyV on a bench we had in the back yard, and he would sit downwind from me just to catch a few wiffs. My college buddies and I still get together and smoke Parodis for old times sake.


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## Malcolm_the_Squid (Jul 5, 2015)

This is great. I've never heard of some of these brands before. I'll have to look them up. Thank you


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## Cigary (Oct 19, 2007)

There just aren't any books out there ( trust me...I've looked ) that detail the early days of cigars esp. in the 50's to the current time that we now enjoy. I grew up and cut my teeth on Cuban Cigars from a family friend in the early 60's before the Embargo...gosh those suckers were amazing or maybe it's because I was a convert at such a young age. The CC's of today are really good but in the pre embargo period those cigars just had a profile that to this day has not been duplicated IMO.

Drug store cigars were really popular in the late 60's to the mid 70's with some of my favorites....as was referred to in earlier posts...A&C Grenadiers really spring to mind. Optimos....those big green churchills that helped new converts from getting sick as they were pretty mild and smelled pretty good for a cheap pack. Some of the others ....El Producto Queens...the ones in the glass tubes were good for a High School Senior who was on the golf team..way ahead of my time I think. Tijuana Smalls were big for a few years....the plastic sweet tip kinda kept me going for a couple of years until I smoked the Hav A Tampas...nice short smoke that I smoked all the time on my first job. Had it not been for that brand I might not have kept my job as I looked forward to having them on my breaks which kept me calm enough to hire in at an entry level position and 15 years later turned into my career as a Plant Manager of a 150,000 square manufacturing facility...guess you could say that I owe that to some great cigars.

Tinder Box was a great transition period where I graduated from machine made cigars to hand rolled and that just made the whole experience so much better. My interest peaked with crude humidors and keeping RH where it belonged and the experience of having a good cigar just increased in measure....hard to beat a cigar that sat in a humidor at 65% for a few months. From there it was on to more research about tobacco...how it's grown and where are the best regions in the world to draw from in growing. Some areas are just a natural incubator for great cigars...the soil content like Cuba and Jalapa regions....to the popular Brazilian tobaccos that I discovered before they became popular....how to note portions of the leaf that makes up so much of the taste of great cigars..medio tiempo leaf that is so popular in the Cohiba Behike can be found in other brands. I found about 5 brands that have that leaf and bought boxes of all of them and while they aren't like the Behike in profile they are a good quality cigar.

For those new hobbyists coming into this world of cigars it can be a very passionate thing and for almost 50 years I've had some amazing cigars and what makes them so good is the care and concern that we give to them. Yes, I am aware that some of us tend to "preach" the ABC's of Always Be Caring for our cigars....the reason is because if you do everything within your power to care for them they taste so much better and you wouldn't have to concern yourselves with so many questions about RH....how long to rest...when to age...what is the best lighting technique...etc. Some just want to smoke a cigar and be done with it...that's fine but don't ask questions about quality and smokeability if you aren't willing to make the experience as good as it can be. Trust me....when you give enough time to a cigar and make it the best it can be then you can truly appreciate how much better the experience is going to be. It's like cooking a Filet Mignon...you can slap it into a frying pan and eat it or you can cook it the way Peter Lugers does in NY...best steak anywhere bar none. 

Some of us older cigar peeps tend to preach a lot but it's only because we've invested our time to make the experience as good as it can be...if you just want a cigar then go to CVS or Walgreens and light em up and enjoy...or you can learn how to improve the overall quality of a great cigar by doing some research and use your own experience to make your cigars something special. What I love to do is I travel and bring some of my best cigars with me to cement the memory of that travel experience...where I can associate the cigar I had with the places I've been and it's better than journaling. The sense of smell as some of you have pointed out is an incredible resource for recorded memories that stay with you for a lifetime...those 1 or 2 hour smoking experiences just stay with you and are as fresh as the day the cigar was smoked...examples of where I had some of my best cigars: Rome, Italy at the Coliseum.....Rock of Gibraltar at the very top of the Rock looking from one continent to the other.....Beaches of Normandy where D-Day was more than a date in June...visualizing what took place on that day where I had two cigars to really get into the history....Stonehenge in the UK....I took a lot of photos but it was the cigar that really made it unique and I can still smell the tobacco at each place I've been.

One last thing...don't keep yourself from ever smoking a freshly rolled cigar...a good one..not those cigars that some part time torcedore rolls in some unnamed cigar store in Ybor City or Miami....but a quality fresh hand rolled cigar that is different than what we enjoy from our favorite manufacturers. When I go to Key West there are a few really good cigar places that have full time rollers and I buy a couple from each place and smoke them over a weeks time...it's well worth the time and money spent.


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## Malcolm_the_Squid (Jul 5, 2015)

Thank you, Cigary. As usual this was a great pleasure to read and I'm just fascinated by the account of your experiences with cigars from your youth to the present. I also really appreciate all the sound advice in cigar keeping and enjoying. I've been enjoying some rather great sticks as of late and since Amy will be home in a few days with a bunch more, I'm sure my experience will only get better. 

I envy your travels. I hope someday, when I'm older, I'll get to relate to smoking a cigar at Stonehenge or on the beaches of Normandy on a more personal level. 

Thanks again for taking the time to write this.


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## JGIORD (Jan 1, 2000)

My Dad used to smoke Dutch Masters and Garcia y Vega. I thought they stunk to high heaven but as I got older I'd smoke them too. My first real cigar given to me was a Paul Gamerian. I don't remember which make. Totally opened my eyes to what cigars could be. From their I progressed to Ashton Classics and HdM Excaliburs.

I loved the La Luna lines that were out in the 90's or early 2000s (I can't remember the date, senility). Gael Courtovron was a great blender but I guess he didn't have the best of business sense. Those cigars were awesome.

Funny, I recently had an urge for an old school smoke I haven't had in decades. HdM Rothschild Double Maduro. I smoked a La Duena recently and it brought back some memories of what that smoke was like. Not that I'm comparing the La Duena to the HdM, the La Duena is a far superior cigar. But some of the flavors I recalled from the HdM were there. So I ordered up a box. Can't wait to get them in.


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## Cigary (Oct 19, 2007)

JGIORD said:


> My Dad used to smoke Dutch Masters and Garcia y Vega. I thought they stunk to high heaven but as I got older I'd smoke them too. My first real cigar given to me was a Paul Gamerian. I don't remember which make. Totally opened my eyes to what cigars could be. From their I progressed to Ashton Classics and HdM Excaliburs.
> 
> I loved the La Luna lines that were out in the 90's or early 2000s (I can't remember the date, senility). Gael Courtovron was a great blender but I guess he didn't have the best of business sense. Those cigars were awesome.
> 
> Funny, I recently had an urge for an old school smoke I haven't had in decades. HdM Rothschild Double Maduro. I smoked a La Duena recently and it brought back some memories of what that smoke was like. Not that I'm comparing the La Duena to the HdM, the La Duena is a far superior cigar. But some of the flavors I recalled from the HdM were there. So I ordered up a box. Can't wait to get them in.


You brought me some more memories of the Hdm...I used to smoke a ton of those in the late 90's and early 2000...double maddies. I was just looking at those this week and almost pulled the tripper on half a dozen brands that I used to smoke a lot of just because of this thread...a walk back into my own history. As you said there are better cigars around but those memories don't fade when you've had a ton of them.....they grab ahold of a few synapses in the brain and attaches itself to them like they were super glued. That particular cigar was a mainstay for me when I lived in Pismo Beach, Ca. where I'd walk the beach every morning with that cigar and that's how I started my day. Taking my cruiser out in the afternoon ( I put an extra large windshield on my bike so I could smoke my cigars...while riding ) gave me another chance to enjoy 101 up and down the coast...maybe one day down to Santa Barbara or up to SF and beyond...Tiburon and the Redwoods. Motorcycles and cruising....just doesn't get any better than that....doing the ride from Palm Beach to Key West or the Blue Ridge Parkway....old Route 66. I doubt anybody remembers the old show called "Then Came Bronson" about a guy who had a 1974 Harley-Davidson Sportster. and travelled the country on it...always a new story but that show got to me and what it did was put a bug in me about traveling....esp. on a motorcycle.


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## Bird-Dog (Oct 16, 2009)

Cigary said:


> I doubt anybody remembers the old show called "Then Came Bronson" about a guy who had a 1974 Harley-Davidson Sportster. and travelled the country on it...always a new story but that show got to me and what it did was put a bug in me about traveling....esp. on a motorcycle.


I remember the bedroll tied to his Sporty's handlebars. I don't think it was a '74, though. The show was long gone by then. Probably a '69 XLH.


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## JDom58 (Jul 27, 2015)

Great show I watched as a kid, For Road shots it was a 1969 XLH Harley Davidson 883 Sportster, for stunts they used a Maico dirt bike modified and painted to look like the Sportster. In the pilot, there is a hill climb where Bronson starts at bottom of hill on Sporty and finishes on Sporty. However all scenes during hill climb are shot on the Maico. ok ok ok I googled it :yo:


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## Bird-Dog (Oct 16, 2009)

JDom58 said:


> Great show I watched as a kid, For Road shots it was a 1969 XLH Harley Davidson 883 Sportster, for stunts they used a Maico dirt bike modified and painted to look like the Sportster. In the pilot, there is a hill climb where Bronson starts at bottom of hill on Sporty and finishes on Sporty. However all scenes during hill climb are shot on the Maico. ok ok ok I googled it :yo:


It would have been known as an XLH900 back then, even though the displacement was the same as later more accurately named 883's.

As a way to steer us back to Malcolm's thread line, how about shows that included cigars?

I'll throw _Columbo_ out there. Maybe not as adventurous as _Then Came Bronson_, but launched around the same era and longer running. I seem to remember the main character, played by Peter Falk, was almost always shown with a half-smoked cigar... and almost always trying to find a light that never materialized. His cigars were reportedly a variety of cheap drug-store brands, which was consistent with the character's frumpy appearance.

We also had cigar ads on TV back then. Anyone remember _"Should a gentleman offer a lady a Tiparillo?"_


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## Ming on Mongo (May 15, 2015)

For those of you old enuff to remember Ernie Kovacs&#8230; :mrgreen:


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## Cigary (Oct 19, 2007)

curmudgeonista said:


> I remember the bedroll tied to his Sporty's handlebars. I don't think it was a '74, though. The show was long gone by then. Probably a '69 XLH.


That is right...there was a rebuild from a couple of guys that put the bike into a museum in 74....love the artwork on the tank with the "eye".

Shows with cigars being featured....A Team,,,,Sons of Anarchy...Sopranos....


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## MichaeldeL (Aug 21, 2012)

My father is a first generation Italian-American... still smokes toscanos to the day. They're pretty strong but definitely a good smoke... and some are still rolled by hand. For me, my saturdays wouldn't be complete without the toscanello caffe in the morning... I highly suggest it.

Oh, and side note--my father is completely convinced Clint Eastwood would make a great president; not based on his political views, but because he smoked Toscanos in all of his spaghetti western movies. There's no telling him otherwise... how much more Italian can you get?


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